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Class IIL^.^1^; 
Book r Q 



CopyrightNi 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



No. 6" 



"No. 6 



99 



A Few Pages from the Diary of 
an Ambulance Driver 

BY 

C. DE FLOREZ 




NEW YORK 

E. P. BUTTON ^ COMPANY 

68i FIFTH AVENUE 



^<b 



Copyright, 19 i 8, 
By E. p. button &- COMPANY 



All Rights Reserved 



Printed in the United States '^f America 



JUN 17 1918 

©Ci.A497798 



^•W/^ 







TO THE GOOD FRIEND 
WHO SHARED IT ALL 



FOREWORD 

It is not possible to add any phrase, 
however emphatic, or any words, how- 
ever earnest, to the praise that has been 
given to devoted and gallant France since 
those fateful days in August when the 
future of civilisation and the fate of the 
world were in the hands of her devoted 
soldiers. The long silent suffering of the 
women and children, the quiet, confident 
— almost gay — resignation of the officers 
and men to seemingly endless conflict can 
never be measured in mere words. These 
things can be seen and felt; they cannot 
be wholly or adequately expressed. 

Anything, however, that helps us to 
appreciate the soul of France is an aid 



viii Foreword 



and an inspiration to us in America for 
whom it is necessary to emulate the ex- 
ample of that devoted people if the war 
is to be won. 

The thing that has struck me most dur- 
ing my visit to France has been — what I 
might term — the silence of the soldier. 
By that I mean his absolute freedom from 
bombast and high-sounding phrase. One 
might almost believe that his apparent 
insouciance as he goes quietly about his 
stern duties covers some indifference. 
The reality is, however, that the French 
soldier feels the absolute impossibility of 
phrasing his sentiments. Everything that 
he loves is so fundamentally involved in 
the conflict that deeds, and deeds alone, 
must count. I have seen them from the 
North and from the South; the grave 
Norman and the quick-tempered man 



Foreword ix 



from the Midi, yet all pervaded by the 
same spirit of simple, quiet, unquestion- 
ing devotion to the immediate work at 
hand — the freeing of French territory 
from the invader. "He is not always gay 
who wishes it," said a great French 
writer, and that French gaiety of spirit 
so admirably depicted in this little book 
is surely one of the great qualities of that 
ancient civilised race which has enabled 
them through the centuries to survive and 
to hold that predominant place in the 
world of Art, Letters and of Thought 
which has given to France the primacy in 
the heart and intellect of civilised man. 
I have seen their burned and devastated 
villages — the scenes of nameless outrage 
— to which the women and children had 
returned after the barbarian retreat that 
they might cultivate the fields and sus- 



Foreword 



tain the husband and the father who was 
away fighting for France. The quiet 
simplicity of these little peasant folk, in- 
tent upon the task of wringing from the 
generous French soil its last grain of sus- 
tenance for the loved ones who are 
defending la Patrie, was more impressive 
than any of the orations heard at banquets 
or upon State occasions. 

The simple recital in these pages of the 
daily routine duty so cheerfully and 
simply done has impressed me more than 
the writings of the literary men who often 
speak rather of their own feelings than 
of that which they have actually seen. It 
is the reaction of the simple soldier, of 
the ordinary peasant, of the little child, 
to the great conflict which really discloses 
the soul of the nation. As a man's real 
nature appears in time of crisis when all 



Foreword xi 



dissimulation and disguise are cast aside 
in the imminent presence of bodily de- 
struction, so that superb spirit of the 
French nation, developed through two 
thousand years of education, inheriting 
the great and real culture of the Roman 
Empire, standing for centuries as a bar- 
rier against the barbarian from the North 
who has threatened civilisation from the 
time of Marius and Caesar as he has 
done at repeated intervals to the present 
day, has now for nearly four years been 
fuUy and completely manifested to the 
modern world. If the best emotions of 
the human heart be not mere chemical 
by-products to be disregarded by progres- 
sive militant nations, but are rather the 
only things which make life worth living, 
and if man be anything other than a scien- 
tific brute, then, indeed, the cause of 



xii Foreword 



France from the beginning has been in- 
distinguishable from that of humanity. 

The two theories of the man brute and 
of the man human met squarely on the 
fields of the Marne — and still battle in 
Flanders and in Northern France; again, 
as in former centuries, must the final con- 
flict take place upon her devoted soil. It 
is fortunate that the lines are drawn so 
sharply. We owe a debt of gratitude to 
the German scientists and thinkers who 
did not shrink from the responsibility of 
justifying as their highest and ultimate 
gospel the triumph of the brute biped 
directed by modern science. Any issue 
less sharply drawn might not have 
brought the United States side by side 
with France and Great Britain. The 
American people, long isolated from 
European affairs, might not have under- 



Foreword 



xiu 



stood that this was not a mere European 
conflict, but transcended the boundaries 
of time and space as the latest and great- 
est phase of the eternal struggle between 
that which is highest and that which is 
lowest in man. 

I am confident that this little book will 
be a useful contribution to our knowledge 
of that ever amazing French spirit which 
brings us assurance that in the end we 
must triumph and that all this sacrifice 
must not and has not been for naught. 
Frederic R. Coudert. 



**No. 6" 

Monday, 6th August, IQI7. 

Monday at 5 a. m. we reported 7 rue 
Frangois Premier. Our mountain of lug- 
gage was piled high together with our- 
selves into three huge camions and in the 
grey light of a misty morning we rumbled 
along through the quiet streets awaken- 
ing sleepy Paris, although Paris is prob- 
ably used to the noise of departing sol- 
diers. Ever since the battle of the Marne 
they have heard the ominous sound. 

The Gare de TEst is as busy as the other 
stations that feed men to the trenches and 
cannon, and receive what is left of those 
who return. It took a bit of doing to get 



**No. 6" 



us entrained, luggage counted and regis- 
tered, and when it was finally done I 
strolled across the street for a cup of 
coffee in one of the typical little cafes that 
thrive around stations as do undertakers 
about hospitals, or tombstone carvers 
about cemeteries. It was a curious little 
corner of the world, this, where poilus 
and officers have their coffee together. I 
shared my table with a French officer, 
like myself off for the front, who kept 
impatiently looking at his watch. Pres- 
ently he jumped up with a smile, "Ah! 
te voila," and she threw her arms around 
his neck and kissed him as I myself should 
have liked to be kissed. It is good to have 
some one who is sorry you are going. I 
gulped down my coffee and left them to 
be alone — but not alone as I was. 

Sadly I looked over my shoulder to 



No. 6 



3 



bid Paris good-bye — good-bye for a while 
or maybe more. 

They are brave, these French women 
who come to take leave of their men. A 
silent embrace, a wistful smile, a tear, 
those they love are going, God only knows 
where, a shrill whistle, a slamming of 
doors, and slowly as if loath to take them 
away the long train pulls out of the sta- 
tion. 

We were in all 43. Five compartments 
seating eight had been reserved for our 
men and an extra compartment for our 
French Lieutenant and our officers. One 
of the compartments was occupied by 
several women, a cross little man and two 
soldiers, and I was amazed when they 
refused to move although our French 
Lieutenant requested them to do so most 
politely. Another sign that France is 



4 ^^No, 6'' 

tired of it all — this lack of respect for 
the military and the lack of authority the 
military have, for it was necessary to call 
the ^'chef du train" to persuade the cross 
little man to move. 

Our train crawls along, stopping every 
now and again because of the tremendous 
traffic. Sanitary trains pulling in, troop 
trains pulling out, supply trains, muni- 
tion trains, all have to be kept moving to 
keep the business of war going. 

The stations we come to are all crowded 
with soldiers, the roads we pass with more 
soldiers, and long convoys; our train, al- 
though a civilian one, carried scarcely 
any civilians; soldiers, nothing but sol- 
diers. France is indeed giving her all. 

We were able to lunch as there was 
a "wagon restaurant" attached and an ex- 
cellent lunch it was. Hors-d'oeuvre 



**No. 6'* 



scrambled eggs, boiled beef, vegetables, 
salad, cheese with wine and coffee, a lunch 
that certainly would not suggest war and 
a train, were it not for the women who 
serve and the black bread. 

At Bar le Due we made a long stop. 
Jellies and jams made it famous in the 
past. Verdun has done so for the future. 
Verdun is 45 kilometres from Bar le Due, 
hence its importance. 

At 4.30 p. m. we arrived at Nancy, our 
destination being the Automobile Park. 
There are several such parks, one at Ver- 
sailles, another at Chalons, but it is here 
that our section is to receive, officially, 
its ambulances from the French govern- 
ment and our first "ordre de mouvement," 
as yet unknown. 

We remained in the station while our 
Lieutenant telephoned to the pare for 



6 **No. 6^^ 

camions to transport our luggage and our- 
selves and we had occasion to observe the 
damage done by Boche aeroplanes. 
Nancy is constantly bombed and the 
wrecked portion of the station is the re- 
sult of a raid a fortnight ago. Directly 
across the square from the station an enor- 
mous hole in the ground is all that is left 
of a cafe, also demolished by a bomb. 

In due course the camions arrived and 
we proceeded to the park, the Lieutenant 
and myself with our chief in his motor, 
as we had to attend to the never-ceasing 
details. 

What a beautiful city this capital of 
Lorraine, with its wonderful cathedral 
fortunately intact in spite of the German 
vandals, its splendid square and noble 
statue of Stanislaus, Due de Lorraine, Roi 
de Pologne. 



**No. 6 



The park, covering many acres, is just 
beyond the city limits. Here are housed 
thousands of camions curiously painted 
to disguise them as a bit of the heavens, 
a clump of trees or a part of the land- 
scape. Camionettes, kitchen motors, am- 
bulances, ravitaillement busses, that in 
other days jolted the Parisians through 
the streets of Paris, tractors, staff cars and 
a miscellaneous collection of automobiles 
of all kinds, amongst them our twenty 
Fiats, our homes and companions for the 
next six months. 

We dined in the soldiers' mess. Our 
comrades, the poilus, cannot complain 
for their fare is good and plentiful, more 
so than at Sandricourt, and they have an 
excellent canteen where beer, wine, choc- 
olate, eggs and many other luxuries can 
be had very cheap, for it is run under an 



8 **No. 6'' 



efficient co-operative system. Two large 
rooms have been assigned to us w^ith a 
washing room between so we are com- 
fortably billeted. The journey was a long 
and tedious one, and we are glad to turn 
in. 

At 9.30 the bugle sounds to the tune of 
^'La dame blanche" and our lights go 
out. We shall dream to-night "d'une 
dame blanche" and wake up to-morrow 
for our first day's service in the French 
army. 



Tuesday, yth August, 

The bugles that put us to sleep wake us 
up — but going to bed and getting up have 
always been a different tune. 

"Est ce qu'il y a des malades?" asks a 
sous officier, popping his head through 
the door. "Non, heureusement, pas de 
malades." We are allowed to fetch our 
coffee from the kitchen, cafe au lit instead 
of cafe au I ait, 

A careful inventory of the cars must 
be made before we take them over, a tedi- 
ous undertaking lasting all day. 

As officier de liaison I wasinvitedby the 
Adjutant of the park to mess with their 
officers. After dinner we were asked by 
these hospitable fellows to partake of beer 
and wine and of what the mess afforded. 

9 



lo "No. 6 



9 9 



An old piano sadly out of tune was 
wheeled into the room, and they sang for 
us "chansons tristes et chansons gaies" 
music that took them back to their pays 
and those they left there three years ago; 
more than one note, I fancy, ended in a 
gulp. We too sang for them, different 
songs that mean the same. 

The Boches will not come to-night; it 
is too dark. We shall sleep undisturbed. 

GERMAN MUSIC 

What Is this music of the guns 

That grumble, snarl and roar? 

It is the music of the Huns 

The ones who made us war. 

Too true has proved their Hymn of Hate — 

The tune their deeds have taught — 

Sing! let it chant their fate, 

Sing ! the dirge they brought, 

And make them dance the Dance Macabre — 

The dance they madly sought. 



Wednesday, 8th August. 

To-day we received our cars and be- 
gan the work of overhauling them. They 
have seen two years' service, at Verdun 
last September and elsewhere. Poor lit- 
tle Fiats, they too are a bit tired. 

Our car is No. 6 and has been chris- 
tened Marguerite Winston. First of all, 
M. W. is taken off to the hose to be 
washed clean of mud, blood and coo- 
ties. We are not yet hardened and shud- 
der at the dark red spots on the brancards, 
on the floor, even on the ceiling. God! 
how it must have spurted as she bumped 
in and out of the shell holes. 

We hear that we shall probably ^^roll" 

in the morning and as orders have come 

to have the cars in readiness we cannot un- 
II 



12 



( ( 



No. 6 



9 9 



dertake much to-day. No. 6 will go with 
a little persuasion, that is always some- 
thing. 

I gave a dinner at the Hotel de Thiers 
and No. 6 was duly christened with a bot- 
tle of champagne. ^^Bonne chanee, petite 
voiture de mis eric or de; don't ever fail us 
when they are waiting for you." 



Thursday, Qth August, 
We leave for St. Nicholas du Port, Deo 
(and the Fiats) volente, at 8.30. Break- 
fast at 7, cars examined, good-bye to the 
commandant and the adjutant, at 8 we 
fall in to receive orders, 8.15 conductors 
at the wheel and assistants at the crank. 
8.25 one shrill whistle — turn them over, 
two shrill whistles — signal ready to start. 
8.30 one whistle to start. The Lieuten- 
ant's staff car moves slowly out of the 
park, followed by the twenty good little 
Fiats all on their best behaviour, and so 
begins our first convoy to St. Nicholas, 
thirteen kilometres away. 

It is very interesting, this first little 
journey over dusty roads that wind their 

way along the picturesque canal; the 
13 



14 ^^No. 6^^ 

banks are green and shady, the waters 
dirty and placid, with only a little ripple 
to mark the wake of a passing barge or a 
little fish that here and there patient fish- 
ermen are trying to take. Not so the 
dusty roads with their endless stream of 
convoys and soldiers ever on the march. 
We halt outside of St. Nicholas while our 
officers go on ahead to arrange for our 
cantonment. No. 20 had a panne but re- 
joined us; the camion had a panne and 
is lost forever. It would be funny were 
it not such a disaster. 

Every section should have three cam- 
ions, an "atelier," a "cuisine," and a third 
for tents, tables and other equipment. We 
are now without any. 

Our quarters having been arranged for, 
we move on, through St. Nicholas, — St. 
Nicholas du Port, if you please, because 



^ ^^No. 6^' IS 

of the canal with the dirty placid waters. 
We rattle through the quaint streets, over 
the cobbles, to the delight of hundreds 
of dirty little urchins and their terrified 
mothers, and turning into the rue St. Jo- 
lain come to a stop in front of the old 
'^brasserie" where we have been billeted. 

A courtyard piled high with manure 
and rubbish in one corner, a latrine in 
the other, a rickety stairway leading to a 
loft and two large rooms, just evacuated 
by poilus who reluctantly left such lux- 
ury; soft straw fairly clean, and a roof. 
The straw was not left without inhabi- 
tants, however, as those of us who cleaned 
it up found out to our dismay. 

We have for cook one Coquelin, a 
cousin, so he says, of that other great art- 
ist, late of the ^'Automobile Pare de 
Nancy." Thirty-five years of cooking, 



i6 "No. 6 



9 9 



five years of pastry, with medals, ribands 
and diplomas to attest. His art must not 
be criticised to-day for there is only 
"singe" and cheese and Pinard, but he 
promises wonders when we are installed, 
as "Monsieur shall see," but "Monsieur" 
is doubtful, for Coquelin has an infamous 
reputation ; the old rascal is always drunk, 
they say. 

All afternoon they worked, these good 
fellows who laugh and never complain 
and when evening came the courtyard 
was a kitchen, a dining-room, a shower- 
bath and many other things besides. The 
Lieutenant is loge down the street at No. 
26 where I too have a room. We dine as 
the sun sets over Nancy and the Avions 
circle overhead. Night comes on, with 
it the stars that bring contentment, and 
maybe the Boches. 



Friday, August 1 0th, 
The work that could not be done at the 
pare is begun. Twenty little Fiats lined 
up in a row in the rue St. Jolain, sur- 
rounded by gamins, present a pitiful ap- 
pearance, as dirty greasy fellows in over- 
alls, with hammers and wrenches tear 
out their vitals; but they will be patched 
up again bye and bye as a surgeon patches 
up a patient when his operation is done, 
and will, we hope, show their gratitude in 
the way motors should. 

Coquelin produced a very savoury rab- 
bit stew for dinner and afterwards we 
strolled ofiP to town for cofifee at the ^Tai- 
san d'Or," St. Nicholas' smartest cafe, 
frequented by the military, where your 

officer sips his coffee and the poilu 
17 



i8 **No. 6 



drinks his "bock" side by side — why not? 
Will they not be side by side in a grave 
later on? 

The chimes in the old cathedral ring, 
the evening service is over. We must 
hurry back through the quiet little streets. 
It is such a beautiful night that the lights 
must not shine; only a few miles away 
as the crows and the Fokkers fly are the 
German lines. 

A great honour has been conferred 
upon me. I have been appointed "Popo- 
tier" of Section 59 and bon gre, mal gre 
must accept. The duties of a popotier 
are to look after the popote or mess. A 
morning conference with Monsieur 
Coquelin, who decidedly is not all there, 
to compose the menu, a trip to market to 
bargain with the old ladies in the square 
for onions and salad, these are the func- 



*'No. 6" 19 



tions of the unhappy popotier — in their 
way of vast importance. 

I am having built by the carpenter and 
cofBn maker two cases for provisions to 
fit on the running board of No. 6. He 
will make me a very special price be- 
cause his boy was carried in one of our 
ambulances. 

"His company left the trenches for an 
attack on a Friday at 10. They were 
obliged to retreat after being cut to pieces 
by machine gun fire and he fell in a 
shell hole with a ball in the knee and 
another in the shoulder. There he spent 
the night side by side with a dead friend 
for a companion. The following day his 
company attacked again, and again were 
repulsed. Unable to move, there he re- 
mained between the lines until Sunday, 
when a sergeant saw him and crawled 



20 **No. 6 



9 y 



out with a flask. That night two soldiers 
came with a stretcher and he was carried 
away to a dressing station, and from there 
taken in one of your ambulances, Mon- 
sieur, to a hospital." 

"Did he get well?" 

"Yes, Monsieur, if it is well to have 
but one leg." 

"Monsieur will have the cases day 
after to-morrow." 



Saturday, nth August. 

All morning it rained, but in the mid- 
dle of the day a beautiful rainbow 
brought a beautiful afternoon; the clouds 
that trouble the heavens blow away as do 
the clouds that trouble our lives. 

"lis viendront ce soir," says a wise old 
fellow who sits in my doorway smoking 
his pipe. He cocks his eye up at the sky 
in the manner of an old tar. They reef 
the sheets when the sailor shakes his head 
in his knowing way, for it will surely 
storm; they get the keys of the cellar 
when my friend shakes his head in his 
knowing way, for it means a raid. 

In the evening after a long day in and 
about and under the car we went as usual 
to the Pheasant. As I passed through the 



21 



22 *^No. 6^' 

crooked little streets on the door of every 
house there is the sign ''Cave voutee" w^ith 
20, sometimes 50 places, and I thought of 
my v^ise old fellow smoking his pipe in 
the doorway. For three years they have 
been dropping bombs on this little town, 
a few miles back of the front lines, so 
when the alarum sounds and you hear the 
whir of the Boche planes overhead, St. 
Nicholas becomes a deserted city. The 
inhabitants quickly disappear off the 
streets and into their cellars away from 
the rain of shrapnel of the French ''75's" 
and the occasional bomb that blows up a 
whole post-office, as it did the one by the 
bridge a week ago. 

The anti-aircraft guns in the distance 
are very active to-night — ^yes! they will 
surely come. 

Sitting at the little tables at the Pheas- 



^*No. 6^^ 23 

ant we can see the rockets and the white 
puffs of the bursting shells over Nancy, 
and as we walk back up the hill the 
alarum sounds — a bugle and the cathe- 
dral bells. 

It is hard to conceive the magnificence 
of it all, hard to believe that death comes 
from the heavens where one sees only the 
stars; but the great search-lights that play 
in every direction see more than we, and 
where they point myriads of shells burst, 
dimming the stars. Presently our guns 
join in, all around us they roar. The 
Germans fly low, very low, the better to 
avoid our guns that cannot fire so well at 
a low angle. 

Sitting in my little window I can dis- 
tinctly hear the whirring propellers, di- 
rectly overhead they sound, and you won- 
der — then they are gone. One by one 



24 **No. 6" 



the guns cease; in the distance you hear 
them again ; the stillness is extraordinary 
after so much din. ^^C'est fini pour ce 
soir,'' for they seldom return. 

It is all so fascinating that one feels 
nothing else except possibly a strange sen- 
sation of disappointment that nothing has 
happened after all. 

The good people leave their cellars to 
the rats once more. Across the courtyard 
the tread of weary feet, old women with 
clanking keys and the wise old man who 
smokes his pipe in the doorway; when he 
nods his head in his knowing way the 
storm is surely over and it is time to go 
to bed. 



Sunday, 12th August, 

Car No. i in charge of the ravitaille- 

ment this week is being overhauled. No. 

6 has volunteered, so at 5 we get up and 

with the "marechal des logis" proceed to 

the station of Varangeville where we 

shall receive our 20 loaves of black bread 

and 40 litres of red wine, the famous 

Pinard, from the ravitaillement train in 

exchange for our "bons." It is early 

when we arrive but already there are 

camions large and small, crowded about 

the siding, come from far and near to 

get their bread and Pinard, too. 

I learned from the waiting poilus 

many new words in a language quite their 

own, and a most excellent expression to 

use if ever a camion backs into you, al- 
25 



26 '*No. 6 



9 > 



most crushing your toe, all of which hap- 
pened to an eloquent little fellow from 
the '^midi;^ 

The daily allowance of meat per man 
is 350 grammes, so off to the ^^abattoirs" 
for our beef or mutton, whichever it may 
be. In a great courtyard many more 
camions waiting their turn, in a pen the 
unfortunate beasts waiting to have their 
throats slit, in a huge Paris bus the di- 
vided carcasses of the unfortunate beasts 
whose throats were slit that soldiers 
might live to slit others ; all very degrad- 
ing and disgusting. 

Surrounded by enormous butchers, 
what makes them so enormous I do not 
know; what makes them so ferocious I 
can guess — surrounded by enormous 
butchers with bloody aprons and drip- 
ping knives, I cannot help but think that 



^*No. 6^^ 27 

Tolstoy and my vegetarian friend Trou- 
betskoy are right; but dinner will come 
and I shall be hungry, the bleatings will 
be forgotten; one must forget, to eat a 
chop. 

There is a co-operative store in most 
of the cantonments administered for the 
army where further supplies are ob- 
tained. This is the method by which 
France feeds her armies. 

A call at the Jardiniere on the way 
home for vegetables and the popotiers 
work is done for the day. 

Last night the first call for an ambu- 
lance was received from Pulligny, 23 
kilometres away. No. 2 went, bringing 
back two "malades assis" to the ^^hopital 
du camp." This morning Nos. 3 and 4 
went out on similar errands, so No. 5 is 



28 **No. 6" 



"en planton," and as cars go out in their 
order, No. 6 is in reserve. 

This is our first work. We are at- 
tached to the 17th Division, the 9th corps 
of the 8th Army, and as our division is 
"en repos," this will probably be the sort 
of work we shall have to do for the pres- 
ent. It is not very interesting ; we should 
prefer active service. Our Frenchmen 
smile in their quiet way; they have had 
three years of it, a bit of everything, so 
they are pleased when they are "en re- 
pos." 

Rain! how often it rains in Lorraine! 
They say that the atmospheric disturb- 
ances caused by the continuous bombard- 
ment is the cause. 

After dinner we read in the papers 
about last night's raid. The Boches did 
no damage but they escaped as they al- 



most always do; a plane is a very small 
thing and the heavens very big. 

My little room under the eaves is not 
very luxurious, but there is a lamp to read 
by and the rain patters on the outside of 
a v^indow pane. Not so far away 
stretch the miles of trenches; there are 
no eaves nor are there window panes for 
the rain to patter against. How often it 
rains in Lorraine! 



Sunday, I2th August, 
Car No. 5 went out early this morn- 
ing, so No. 6 is "en planton," interfering 
with our plans for the day. I had hoped 
to go to mass to the great cathedral that 
has stood for all time. St. Nicholas has 
always preserved it even during the 
Thirty Years War, when the town was 
destroyed by fire, and during the war of 
1870; and so he always will, the good 
people tell you. The devout believe that 
only he could have stopped the German 
invasion when the town was threatened in 
1914. Your patron saint did well, my 
friends; St. Nicholas would have fared 
no better than Rheims or Louvain at the 
hands of the barbarians. 

A rheure de la soupe, 12.30 by the 
30 



*'No. 6" 31 



clock, a call came for an ambulance, two 
^'assis'' to be evacuated from Pulligny, 
two from Frolois, so there is no soupe 
and No. 6 starts out upon its first errand 
of mercy. By the aid of our maps we 
find our way over the rolling hills, 
through Menancourt past the aviation 
camps, through the green woods and 
golden wheat fields, where ever watchful 
batteries of good 75's are concealed. 
Several regiments of our division are 
quartered at Frolois. In a dirty narrow 
little street we stop before a stable with 
a red cross sign. This is the "infirm- 
erie"; a courtyard with benches for the 
convalescing, a low-ceiled room with 
heaps of straw upon which are lying hud- 
dled up in their blankets numerous 
"malades." In a far corner is the oper- 
ating department, a stretcher upon two 



32 **No> 6^^ 

wooden horses with a bucket beneath and 
a table beside with bottles of disinfectants 
and surgical instruments. 

We collect our two "malades," tagged 
and labelled like so much luggage, and 
proceed through the usual crowd of filthy- 
children in the direction of PuUigny 
where we take on two more; one of them 
a great Senegal black, who makes consid- 
erable fuss at having to leave his belong- 
ings and his rifle with the bayonet he 
loves so well. However, the thought of 
a ride in a very smart ambulance con- 
soles him, and he shows his delight and a 
row of white teeth in a grin of satisfac- 
tion. Out of the four, three have been 
afflicted with the same horrible disease, 
the fourth has probably been saved by a 
badly fractured arm. 

From Pulligny we return to the 



^*No, 6^^ 33 

^^Hopital de Triage" or clearing hospital 
where they and their papers are exam- 
ined. One is assigned to the ''Hopital du 
Camp" — an excellent establishment built 
by the Germans for their wounded in 
1870 — and the others to Jarville, an 
evacuation hospital just outside Nancy. 
Good little No. 6 has performed its first 
task and the day's work is over. 

In a little cafe on the way back we find 
some beer and cheese, and in a little gar- 
ret where the rain beats against the win- 
dow, a night's rest. 



Monday, August ijtk. 
There is so little to do while our divi- 
sion remains "en repos" that our car will 
probably not be called out again, so we 
have permission to go over the motor, a 
two days' job. There is very little activ- 
ity at the front but always a certain move- 
ment of troops. This afternoon two 
fresh regiments passed down the hill and 
away to the trenches, cheerful fellows, 
rested and gay, with never a thought that 
some will not return. In one hand a few 
flowers, what remains of the past; the fu- 
ture in the other, a grim rifle with a "Ro- 
salie" that shines in the sun. They shrug 
their shoulders to shift their pack and 
smile as they wave good-bye, whilst up 
the hill with weary tread a relieved regi- 

34 



'*No. 6" 3S 



merit comes trudging by. Covered with 
mud, tired and footsore, staggering un- 
der the weight of their kit, no smile upon 
their haggard, sweaty faces. These poor 
fellows have only the thought that soon 
they must return. Poor France! for 
three years your soldiers have borne the 
brunt of it. 

WHY? 

Like canard de Rouen for slaughter fattened, 
Like a cocotte dressed with every care, 
Like a school boy taught with pains unsparing 
To kill or be killed — out there. 

By old men and lads admired, flattered. 
Cared for by harlots who know not how to care; 
Wined and made to feel, to want, to crave 
To kill or be killed — out there. 

By girls and by old women feted, petted, 
In villages that lead to God knows where, 
Bringing you at last to No Man's Land — 
To kill or be killed — out there. 



36 "No. 6 



>> 



By priests and patriots cajoled, exhorted 
To care not for the flesh, — the soul beware — 
The other was but meant, mon brave poilu. 
To kill or be killed — out there. 

Oozing brains from a bashed-in skull, 
A face that was, eyes glassy and dull, 
A hole in a chest from a bayonet thrust, 
A shattered thigh from a shrapnel "bust," 
A ripped open belly, bulging guts, 
Emptying bowels in bloody shell ruts. 
Gory stumps whence legs are gone. 
Gaping sockets whence arms are torn. 
Whiff of gas and bit of shell — 
Almost welcome midst such hell — 
Left where you fell to squirm and bleed 
And rot and stink and vultures feed. 

God in His wisdom the reason knows; 
God took you — God keep you is the prayer 
Of some who live because others were doomed 
To kill or be killed — out there. 



At considerable expense we bought 
many tins of Ripolin. The ^'blanc de 



^^No. 6^^ 37 

neige" removes the bloodstains — there 
will be others. No. 6 looks spick and 
span and is at last ready for business ; very 
satisfactory, as our cars are to be inspected 
to-morrow by our Lieutenant and some 
other French officers. 

After dinner we went to the cinema. 
Everywhere there are cinemas de Varmee, 
with comic films to amuse the soldiers. 
This is one of the ways that France dis- 
tracts and diverts her armies. 

Coquelin the impossible has been sent 
back to the pare at Nancy. The new 
'^cuisto'^ is a great improvement. 



'Wednesday, August 15th, 

Fete de rAssomption, 

In all the windows there are flowers 
and in the Cathedral a special service for 
the Virgin. We must have something to 
turn to in moments of affliction; France 
has become deeply religious. It is easy 
to guess what they have come to pray for, 
all these kneeling soldiers in blue and 
prostrate women in black. 

In the afternoon I visited the aviation 
camp; the sun was shining when we 
started, but before arriving it began to 
pour and we were obliged to stop in a lit- 
tle shack for shelter. Two soldiers of- 
fered us cans to sit upon, for it was a 

storehouse of petrol and essence, and 
38 



^^No. 6^^ 39 

while we watched the rain that fell in 
torrents and waited for it to let up, one 
of them told us many tales. He was an 
interesting fellow, this poilu, with a 
keen mind and a rare sense of humour. 

'^There is no longer any fighting, Mon- 
sieur, no battle of the Marne, where out 
of a company of 200, nine were left; 
where men went for four days without 
food or drink." 

It is incredible that men should be 
alive after such hardships, incredible 
that they should be sane after such hor- 
rors. My friend with the sense of 
humour smiles contentedly, describing 
how he bashed in the bald pate of a Ger- 
man "tant qu'il y avait de la tete je tapais 
dessus"; and he roars with laughter at 
the thought of his comrade Josef, — ^Josef 



40 **No. 6'' 



waving his arms and shouting frantically, 

'Trends garde, v'la un Boche qui te 
vise." 

''Just then, Monsieur, a bullet came 
into Josef's mouth, in one jaw, out of the 
other, shooting away a handful of teeth; 
that's all, Monsieur, just the teeth, nest 
ce pas drole?" 

But a far-away look comes into his 
eyes as he thinks of his "pays la has"; 
seriously he asks when the Americains 
are coming, when it will be over. 

In my opinion it will never end under 
the present conditions of fighting; the re- 
sources of men and money are greater 
than the destruction. The economic col- 
lapse of Germany, some great invention, 
a revolution, labour or socialistic troubles, 
the complete mastery of the air, thousands 
of air planes to fly across the Rhine when 



**No. 6'' 41 



the harvests are golden and could be de- 
stroyed by incendiary bombs, something 
of this sort will be necessary. 

My friend agrees, popping shells back 
and forth to kill a few poor devils in a 
trench who will be replaced by as many 
more is useless. 

We visited the many hangars, huge 
tents housing seven or eight planes, Nieu- 
ports of the latest type and Spads with 
their wonderful Hispano Suiza motor, 
capable of making 200 kilometres. 

The age limit is 25 years, so the aviators 
are mere boys; extraordinary that at 20 
they can have learned all the things one 
must know to be a pilot; not only know 
how to fly, but how to shoot, how to photo- 
graph, how to navigate, how to wireless 
and a thousand other tricks of the trade 



42 **No. 6'^ 

only taught by experience. It is the most 
gallant service of all, the only service 
where a bit of chivalry remains. 

They fight fair and in the open, and 
when they die, as they all do sooner or 
later, they die as they fight, fair and in 
the open; better by far than being man- 
gled or crippled or gassed. 

A very dapper little French captain, 
the commander of the camp, came and 
spoke to us. Curiously enough he first 
flew with Bleriot, whom I dined with not 
so many years ago when he arrived in 
London after his flight across the Chan- 
nel. Thanks to the Captain's wireless op- 
erator, I have the interesting photos taken 
over St. Nicholas and surrounding coun- 
try. 

A weary trudge back to St. Nicholas 



and the Pheasant for dinner, then bed- 
then sleep, undisturbed by the Fokkers 
whose wings, too, have been clipped by 
the rain. 



Friday, IJth August. 

The amount of labour entailed by war 
is appalling. For the few million soldiers 
actually fighting, millions and millions 
are working, amongst them ourselves, all 
day it lasts. "En repos" has no other 
meaning; and these days of no importance 
are occupied cleaning, adjusting, paint- 
ing. Cars are like women, just as vain, 
just as perverse, requiring just as much 
attention, and often not any more grate- 
ful. 

The post arrives with news of the out- 
side world, both good and bad, and one 
is a day nearer the end. 



44 



Saturday, l8th August, 

We are still without equipment. It is 

doubtful if we shall ever have any. A 

soldier's life these days is not so certain 

as his death, so we have decided on a trip 

to Nancy to purchase kitchen supplies; 

the "popote" will be bankrupt but the 

chef happy and much of our happiness 

depends upon his. Nancy was being 

bombed by German avions but the little 

white puffs in the blue sky were not over 

the road. When we returned we learned 

that they had come to St. Nicholas also, 

one of them to stay. 

A little old man of 14, tattered and 

torn, footsore and weary, wandered into 

camp looking for a crust and a pile of 

straw. His story is that of thousands of 
45 



46 ^'No. 6^^ 

others without a home or parents; the 
Germans could account for both in differ- 
ent ways. 

Augustin Lombard, poor little chap, is 
taken in and will work for the run of 
his teeth while the section remains here. 

We have heard nothing as yet about 
our movements, but we are anxious to go 
now that No. 6 is ready. 



Sunday, IQth August, 
The warm sun is shining, it is too beau- 
tiful to work, almost too beautiful to fight. 
Many of us went to mass, Catholics and 
Protestants alike seem to need a bit of 
religion. The new chef, who is quite a 
^'cordon bleu," surpassed himself and the 
popotier supplied cakes from the best 
patisserie, but the Germans came while 
we were lunching; five of them cruising 
over our heads like a battleship squadron, 
not any larger than birds at such a tre- 
mendous height. The '^soixante quinze" 
on all sides blaze away at them, but how 
hopeless it seems; meanwhile the big 
guns, probably 15 kilometres away, are 
firing; they are bombarding Dombasle 
and the usines, fortunately with no suc- 

47 



I 

48 ^^No. 6^^ 

= I 

cess. God is not with the Germans in 
spite of the Kaiser. 

For two hours it lasted, the blue sky 
dotted with white puffs, shrapnel falling 
with a clatter on the roofs, all so imper- 
sonal that it seems foolish. Finally they 
disappear in the direction of their lines 
and it is Sunday once more. A warm 
lazy day with no work to do. 



Monday, 20th August. 

Sometimes I feel as if I had gone very 
far away into a different world where 
there is no time; the days come and go 
sometimes with nothing to do, for we are 
still "en repos." One, possibly two cars 
go out each day, usually to PuUigny or 
Frolois, to evacuate ^^malades" or poor 
devils gone mad. To-day we had two, 
the thought of having to go back to the 
trenches did it. Why there are no more 
I do not understand, maybe because we 
all have had a bit of madness inoculated 
into us and are consequently immune. 

The Boches came as usual ; they never 
neglect us when the stars shine, but we are 
getting blase and do not bother turning 
over in bed. The beds are soft and have 

49 



so ^*No> 6^' 

sheets ; soon there will be no sheets unless 
a winding one. 

Good friends who visit this lonely spot, 

Weep not, weep not. 
Pray that the soul to Heaven has got 
Of the body that stayed to rot. 



Tuesday, 2Ist August. 
The director of the great works at 
Dombasle asked us to call upon him, so 
we went this afternoon, and, together with 
some French officers, were shown over 
their enormous plant. Most of the huge 
machines that night and day work so well 
for France were made in Germany; that 
is probably why the Germans have tried 
so hard for the past three years to destroy 
Dombasle and this particular usine. At 
all events they have bombed it incessantly 
and several times caused great damage; 
only a few weeks ago they succeeded in 
demolishing the gas-tanks. The labour- 
ers go about with steel helmets and gas- 
masks ever in readiness, prepared when 

the alarum sounds to make for the spe- 
51 



52 *^No. 6^^ 

cially constructed dug-outs and other 
safety refuges provided. There are 
about 2,000 workmen employed, a large 
percentage being blacks from Africa, and 
the number of women has increased from 
20 before the war to 300 now. This is 
how France keeps her great industries 
going. 

We walked back to the Pheasant for 
dinner, along the peaceful canal, where 
old men fish and little boys bathe, past 
the old church at Rossieres with its over- 
crowded cemetery, where women in black 
with eyes that are red put fresh flowers 
on fresh graves. They must be uncom- 
fortable, these soldiers, buried so close 
together, but even the cemeteries were 
not prepared for such a war and they are 
not so efficient in France as in Germany 
where they can use them for glue. 



Wednesday, 22nd August. 

No. 6 was repainted this morning, a 
fresh coat of grey paint that makes No. 
6 very proud, and also equipped with 
steel helmets and gas-masks and stocked 
with "singe," iodine, chocolate, plaster, 
brandy, pills and many other things. 
There is a rumour, the vague rumour that 
comes from no one knows where, that we 
shall soon be moving. The rumour 
grows, the "genie" is leaving to-morrow 
and the day after the cyclists go. 

The rumour has been confirmed and 
we shall leave Sunday morning at eight, 
we think for Baccarat, but that is not 
certain. The English in Flanders have 
begun an offensive ; the French at Verdun 
are doing the same. To-day they ad- 

53 



54 



**No. 6 



vanced on a 15 kilometre front; if it con- 
tinues we may go in that direction. To- 
night the big guns are very active, they 
seem to be calling us. Where the 17th 
goes we go. 



Thursday, 23rd August, 
Sunday we move on; the poor devils 
back into the trenches for a whiff of gas 
or a bit of shrapnel; we, the slaughter- 
house department, to pick up the pieces. 
We have received orders to start for Bac- 
carat at eight o'clock in the morning. 
No. 6 is ready so there is nothing to do 
in the meantime. 

Our little vagabond was taken off to 
town and provided with a complete out- 
fit; after a cold shower that I fear he did 
not altogether enjoy he looks very differ- 
ent from the forlorn little beggar who 
wandered into camp a few days ago. The 
bad news of our moving was broken to 
him very gently; he takes it all very philo- 
sophically, but in his quiet way I think 
55 



56 **No. 6'" 



certain plans are being laid, and I have 
an idea that somehow or other he will 
turn up in Baccarat. 



Friday, August 24th. 
I have a good little friend, his years 
are few but his usefulness great. When 
the unfortunate popotier with his befud- 
dled brain has forgotten what the "cuisto" 
especially asked him not to forget, he 
coasts down the hill on his bicycle and 
pedals back up again with the butter, the 
oil or the garlic. To-day I borrowed his 
bicycle to go to Vitrimont, 14 kilometres 
away on the road to Luneville. We took 
the wrong path outside of Dombasle and 
lost ourselves. How easy to take the 
wrong path in this world and lose our- 
selves! Sometimes it is well as in this 
instance when it led us up a hill and 
over a ridge where suddenly we came 



57 



< « M^ C ' ' 



58 ^*No, 6 

upon one of the concealed batteries that 
protect St. Nicholas. 

We stopped to enquire the way of some 
officers who were scrutinising the heavens 
and they showed us through their glasses 
a Boche coming our way. It is extraordi- 
nary how they observe them, these specks 
in the sky. The German travels fast, the 
speck becomes a Taube, and presently the 
battery opens up and the little white 
puffs appear all around him. Another 
battery is firing, too, and he seems a bit 
worried for he climbs and drops and 
changes his direction, trying to escape the 
shrapnel that bursts all about him. 

It is fascinating to watch; sometimes it 
seems as if he had been hit but the little 
puffs blow away and still he flies. It lasts 
for half an hour and then he vanishes into 
a cloud, full speed on his way home. 



^^No. 6^^ S9 

This is the first time that I have seen a 
battery of ''soixante quinze" in action; 
they are marvellous indeed. We wish 
them better luck next time, hoping they 
will not be blown up to-night as a result 
of the Boche's observations, and continue 
on our way. 

Along the winding canal to Crepic 
where I saw for the first time the unmis- 
takable evidence of German "Kultur." 
Crepic was occupied by them for sev- 
eral days in 1914 and Crepic was put to 
the torch when they were forced to retire. 
The inhabitants who were able to flee or 
hide have returned to rebuild their 
homes; little rows of graves here and 
there are the homes of those who will not 
return. 

In spite of a punctured tire we finally 
arrived at Vitrimont. Before the war it 



6o **No. 6" 



was a peaceful little corner of the world, 
where the simple bourgeois cultivated his 
fields and fattened his pigs, while women 
gathered mirabelles for confiture and 
fattened the children. Then war came 
and the German hordes swept over Lor- 
raine, like a pest of locusts leaving desola- 
tion in their path. Fortunately their oc- 
cupation did not last long and they with- 
drew rather precipitately without ac- 
complishing their fiendish work as effi- 
ciently as German methods have done 
elsewhere. A few homes and a part of 
the church were left standing; out of the 
ruins, like the Phoenix arising from the 
ashes, there is arising to-day a new Vitri- 
mont, thanks to some American ladies 
whose generosity and energy know no 
bounds. Vitrimont is being reconstruct- 
ed with better streets and a finer square, 



( ( 



No. 6" 6i 



with a drinking-fountain. The inhabi- 
tants will have modern houses with fur- 
naces to keep them warm instead of heaps 
of manure piled high in the courtyards; 
they will have a school and a mill to grind 
their wheat. 

It was indeed a great pleasure to have 
tea with the wonderful woman who is re- 
sponsible for this noble undertaking, who 
for the past year has lived here and toiled, 
beloved by these good people whose lives 
she is also reconstructing. We sat in a 
little summer-house with geranium boxes, 
overlooking the green meadows; to-day 
all is calm and peaceful but only eight 
miles away are the German guns. Let us 
hope that they will be silenced forever be- 
fore Vitrimont is rebuilt. 

A dusty ride back to St. Nicholas, pur- 
sued by an endless stream of camions that 



62 ^^No. 6^^ 

ramble along the military road, shaded on 
either side by tall poplars and crosses. 

Fortunately it is a cloudy night so the 
French officers who command the bat- 
tery opposite our cantonment are able to 
dine with us at the Pheasant. 

A very pleasant company and an in- 
teresting dinner; to-morrow we shall 
dine with them and the night after some- 
where else, if one can plan so far ahead. 



Saturday, 25th August. 

A day of rest spent looking forward to 
dining with our friends. They have 
promised us a show if the moon and the 
Germans come out, so we pray for the 
clouds to blow away. 

It is not surprising that modern war- 
fare has become so scientific with half the 
brains of the world trying to exterminate 
the other half. The 75 as adapted to 
anti-aircraft purposes is very effective. 
Automatically and in the fraction of a 
second must be made a calculation of the 
distance and the height of a plane, its 
speed, the velocity and direction of the 
wind and other conditions affecting both 
object and projectile, also the necessary 

corrections and the timing of the fuse to 
63 



64 ^^No. 6>> 

detonate the shell where it is figured the 
plane will be. Occasionally they bring 
one down. 

Eleven of us sat down to dinner in the 
little mess shack, painted by a camou- 
flage artist of such real merit that even 
the birds are deceived. Our hosts re- 
member the cocktail of the night before, 
so I give the recipe of one brewed in a 
bucket with a lump of ice, which they 
have gone to such trouble to procure 
from the brasserie of St. Nicholas. Du- 
bonnet, two eggs, ^Toilu," two lemons 
and a dash of brandy, served in water 
tumblers; it made a good, if not alto- 
gether pleasant start. 

Wonderful fellows, these hospitable 
Frenchmen, who seem to have ransacked 
the country to provide a most extraordi- 
nary dinner. 



**No. 6'* 65 



Voici le menu: 

Canadian bean soup 

Melon 

Filet d'Harengs 

Haricots verts, sautes au beurre 

Homard, sauce mayonnaise 

Filet de Boeuf, pommes rotles. 

Langue de BcEuf, sauce piquante 
Salade. — Fromage 
Macarons de Nancy 
Fruits 
Cafe noir 
Pinard 
Bourgogne 
Champagne 

Fortunately the clouds did not blow 
away and the Germans did not come. 
Damn the Germans ; there were not many 
left when we got through with them. It 
was a happy night, like happy nights all 
too soon ended. We wander back 
through the blackness, leaving them on 
the top of their hill to watch, leaving 



66 *^No, e'* 

them with our good wishes and the hope 
that we shall meet soon again. 

Starless night, tranquil, still. 

Silent, calm the plain, the hill 

But for the murmur of countless souls 

Of bodies rotting in deep shell holes 

Crying in anguish for vengeance 'til 

Their wail is answered by guns that kill. 



Sunday, August 26th. 

A round of the town to pay up the 
popotes accounts. We have lived high, 
still they are not many. 

Mass and a wonderful sermon upon 
the lack of the greatest quality — grati- 
tude; we cannot be without it to-day, we 
who have neither crutches nor mourning 
to wear. 

After lunch a gas-mask drill; one can- 
not be too proficient in their use as every 
day they improve in the pleasant art of 
deadly fumes. No longer does it come 
in great clouds that one can see approach- 
ing. It comes now in shells that burst 
almost noiselessly, invisible and without 
odour, toppling over a gun crew without 

warning; it comes toward you wafted by 
67 



68 "No. 6 



9 9 



the gentle summer breezes, with the 
sweet smell of violets or new-mown hay, 
but more deadly than the "aqua tofana" 
of the Medicis, to those who neglect their 
masks. 

After dinner there occurred the most 
terrible calamity. A rude beggar had 
words with the chef, a gentleman of great 
temperament. The beggar was so un- 
fortunate as to call the chef "malhon- 
nete," to which the chef replied that the 
beggar was an "espece de fumier." The 
beggar thereupon asserted that the chef 
was an "embusque," and as this was be- 
yond all endurance to a gentleman of 
great temperament, the beggar was 
driven from the courtyard with some sort 
of a murderous kitchen implement. The 
beggar thereupon complained to the 
Lieutenant who attempted to rebuke the 



^^No, 6'' 69 

chef, a very unhappy moment to have 
chosen, as the gentleman of great tem- 
perament was in such a state of indigna- 
tion and rage that the Lieutenant received 
what the chef had not had time to say 
to the more fleet-footed beggar. I ar- 
rived in time to head off the chef who 
was running down the hill, frantically 
gesticulating, in pursuit of the Lieuten- 
ant who had retreated to the bureau. 

**Nom de Dieu," said he, ^'they can 
shoot me if they will, but they cannot call 
me embusque: no longer will I cook for 
the cochons, I, who have three years of 
service with the colours, — I, who have 
never made soup for others than gentle- 
men." 

Here indeed was a fine mess. One 
must think quickly in such moments as 
these and handle such a delicate situa- 



TO ^^No. 6^^ 

tion with the finesse of a Richelieu, or 
lose a jolly good cook. Entreaties and 
threats were of no avail, excuses and 
promises in vain. 

^^Monsieur, I will do anything for you, 
my life, my skill is at your disposal 
always, but I will no longer cook and that 
Lieutenant shall hear what I have to say." 

Luck was on my side, however, for 
just then the threatening clouds broke 
and rain came in torrents to cool the 
ardour of the cook. Finally I persuaded 
him to return under the archway out 
of the storm to hear me further. Little 
by little the storm in the heavens 
and in the breast of the gentleman of 
great temperament subsided, we shook 
hands and I had his promise that he 
would allow the matter to rest until to- 
morrow. Not an assured victory, but I 



*^No. 6'' 71 

have hopes that Section 59 will not be de- 
prived of his art, this gentleman of great 
temperament. 

"He does his bit as best he can 
With musket, sword, or pot and pan.'* 



'Monday, 2'/th August, 
Our good landlady awakened us early; 
poor soul, she is very sorry to see us go 
and so touched with the little plants we 
sent her. "Mais le bon Dieu vous gar- 
dera; vous reviendrez et vous serez tou- 
jours les bienvenus." So we breakfast, 
the cars are loaded and at 9 a. m. our con- 
voy of twenty little Fiats, headed by the 
staff car, with a camionette loaned by the 
Pare, bringing up the rear. We roll 
slowly down the hill and are off to Bac- 
carat for our first active service at the 
front. It must have rained hard last 
night, the roads are without dust, a god- 
send to a convoy. The early morning is 
crisp and cool, the scenery beautiful, the 

journey without incident. 
72 



At 1 1.30, on schedule, we arrive at Bac- 
carat, famous for the glass that adorns 
the white tables and the game that adorns 
the green. Four cars left for the front 
immediately, the others are unloaded and 
will follow in turn; mine will not come 
until to-morrow. 

From beneath a dozen duffle bags out 
pops Augustin Lombard, half squashed 
and grinning in a sheepish way. All 
sorts of terrible things must happen to 
you, Augustin, for disobeying the strict 
orders meant to be disobeyed. 

This sector is very quiet at present, con- 
sequently there is but little work; four 
cars remain constantly on duty at the four 
towns of Montigny, Badonviller, Her- 
berviller, and Ogerviller, subject to 
orders. They leave at 12 o'clock one 



74 ^^No. 6^^ 

day, returning the next, making a tournee 
de ramassage on the way. 

We are quartered in the great cristal- 
lerie that once employed five thousand 
men and is now partly shut down and 
partly operated by women and children. 

A busy afternoon for the popotier, to 
find a mess hall and superintend the in- 
stallation of the kitchen. We succeeded 
in renting a small room where we shall 
be very crowded but warm and dry. 
Monsieur le chef, a gentleman of great 
temperament, who must be humoured 
and pampered in' order to exercise his art, 
"parce que, mon lieutenant, les vrais 
chefs sont des artistes," Monsieur le chef, 
thank God, is contented with his facili- 
ties. He showed his appreciation by giv- 
ing us an excellent dinner, after which 
we strolled to town for coffee. 



^^No. 6^^ 75 

Baccarat affords nothing very luxuri- 
ous in the way of cafes. Good old ^Tai- 
san d'or," forgive us our mockery! It is 
the way of man and the world only to ap- 
preciate things at their true value when 
they have been taken from us; so our 
hearts are full of regrets and longing for 
the little garden of the Pheasant with its 
little tables, the cross old parrot, the ge- 
nial old lady who welcomed us with such 
a cheery ^'Bon soir" and the dear little 
girl who brought the coffee and the 
"poilu." 

War and the Germans have left their 
traces in Baccarat. Half the cathedral 
including the steeple has been shot away, 
half the town has been razed by fire. The 
Huns as usual before withdrawing ap- 
plied the torch. 

Baccarat is a centre of considerable 



76 *^No. 6^^ 

military importance ; it is here that Gen- 
eral Marchand of Fachoda fame makes 
his headquarters, and it is from here that 

the front lines as far as and as far 

east as are fed with men, munitions 

and food. 

Never ceasing convoys arrive and 
leave, artillery trains come and go con- 
stantly, the weary infantry pass through 
on their way back into the trenches or on 
their way out, — what a difference! 

It begins to rain, "on est bien chez soi." 
In a comfortable little room in the little 
brick house of an honest ouvrier "on se 
couche." 



Tuesday, 28th August, 
At twelve o'clock we leave for Mon- 
tigny to relieve car No. 3, supplied with 
our "ordre de mouvement," some cold 
meat, a bottle of Pinard, blankets and a 
bloody brancard to sleep upon. 

It is interesting to note as one travels 
along these roads that lead to the front 
lines how elaborately the country back 
of them has been prepared; everywhere 
there is barbed wire, fields that once grew 
sugar beets are now sown with rusty 
spikes and five prong wire. They reap 
their harvest still, these fields, a harvest 
of dead. The roads when visible from 
the German lines are screened for miles. 
Every little wood has its concealed bat- 
tery, every little ridge machine guns, 
77 



78 **No. 6'' 

trenches and dug-outs everywhere and 
more barbed wire. The nearer the lines, 
of course the more defences there are, also 
tunnels and mines that could blow whole 
regiments of Boches to Hell. 

One realises more and more why we 
have arrived at a sort of checkmate where 
both sides find it equally difficult to ad- 
vance, and more and more am I con- 
vinced that the war will not end under 
the present conditions of fighting. 

At the '^poste de secours" outside of 
Montigny we find car No. 3 waiting for 
us to relieve him. No. 3 starts back with 
his load, making the "tournee de ramas- 
sage" on his way in and we remain on 
service for 24 hours. 

Montigny was once a little village on 
a hill overlooking a peaceful stream and 
green meadows with other little hills and 



*^No. 6^^ 79 

villages in the distance. Montigny had 
a few hundred contented inhabitants; 
Montigny had a fine little church. Now 
there is nothing left; no church, a few 
demolished houses without windows or 
roofs; that, however, makes but little dif- 
ference, one is so often obliged to sleep in 
the cellars. Where are those who once 
lived here in peace? Little crosses on 
the hillside account for the men; are the 
women any better off? 

At present the 37th regiment is quar- 
tered here; the officers and men spend 
sixteen days in the trenches and eight days 
in between "en repos." Once during 
every "periode de repos" the gas-masks 
are tested, and as to-day was the day ap- 
pointed to test them we were able to try 
ours for the first time. Thirty of us at 
a time, after adjusting our masks, were 



8o ^*No. 6^^ 

closed in a small room where the Major 
exploded a gas cartridge. We remained 
for five minutes and, at the end of that 
time, if ^'ga ne pique pas" you conclude 
that your mask is quite all right. Noth- 
ing could be more uncomfortable to wear 
than a gas-mask; it must be worn very 
tight in order that no gas shall enter; 
breathing is difficult and your poor head 
soon aches. A new device that I also 
tried is a great improvement but unfor- 
tunately too expensive for general use. 
Air is inhaled through a reservoir carried 
on the back which makes the gases harm- 
less, and then exhaled through a valve 
that makes respiration quite natural. 
This mask is good for one hundred hours 
instead of only two or three. As the 
gases are developed and improved, so 
also must »;he masks be. There is a new 



^*No. 6^' 8i 

gas called "moutarde" that is affected by 
moisture so that masks will not suffice and 
the pores of the skin as well have to be 
protected. They are also experimenting 
with cyanide and others equally deadly, 
so that soon nothing other than a diverts 
outfit or a hermetically sealed coffin will 
save you. 

There are no orders, nothing to do but 
drink beer with a hospitable officer who 
invited us to his humble mess to smoke 
and chat with several other good fellows. 
Over the glasses with tales of adventures 
and women we forget there is war, and 
are only reminded from time to time that 
the Boches are but a mile away by an 
occasional gun and the whistle of a shell 
overhead on its way to or from the Ger- 
man lines. 

In the crepuscule I strolled up the hill 



82 *^No. 6^^ 

along the road that leads to the first line 
trenches; beautiful poplars line the road 
on both sides standing straighter than the 
sentries. An innocent little wood where 
men have slit each other's throats and 
stuck bayonets into each other's bellies 
now belongs to us; beyond "no man's 
land," and beyond that what we are fight- 
ing for. 

We have been invited to dinner so I 
return on time. There is a saying "the 
nearer the front the higher the life." The 
fare may not be so good as at the Cafe 
de la Paix but the bread is whiter in this 
Cafe de la Guerre. A bare little room 
with a stone floor in a half blown up 
house, by the light of a dim and smelly 
lamp we linger over our coffee and 
poilu rum, the "world forgetting, by 
the world forgot." Outside the rain 



^^No. 6^^ 83 

beats against the closed shutters, it is per- 
fectly still and black except for the star- 
shells and rockets that reassure you ; they 
do not sleep, those who watch out there. 
What have we not talked about; there is 
nothing left; the lamp is burning low, the 
bottle is empty, so we go to bed in a room 
with crumpled walls and only a dilapi- 
dated iron bedstead and a lousy, blood- 
stained mattress, by the light of a solitary 
candle. Poor little candle ! A great blan- 
ket is hung over the window to hide the 
flickering light that might shine through 
the shell torn shutters. Outside it rains 
in a dismal way on a dismal world and 
the wind moans in a dismal way for a dis- 
mal reason. 

^Xe vent qui vient a travers les mon- 
tagnes." 



Wednesday, 2Qth August. 

We slept in our boots ready for a call, 
but none came, so we slept until the sun- 
shine crawled through the shrapnel holes 
in the shutters. After a washup in the 
cool little stream that comes down from 
the Vosges, we had our coffee and started 
out accompanied by our good friend the 
Lieutenant, to inspect the trenches. The 
same road of yesterday leads toward them 
and we can drive part of the way, as far 
as a little "poste de secours" in a little 
clearing, where we leave the ambulance. 

A few hundred yards further on the 
road is barred by barbed wire entangle- 
ments and as the shell holes prove it is 
not always neglected by the Boche, we 
enter the communicating trenches that 

34 



zigzag through the wood. What a maze 
of trenches with a '^cachabis" every hun- 
dred yards or so! queer little dug-outs 
where men live like moles. 

They are fairly dry in spite of the rain 
of yesterday, but the water will be above 
the corduroy flooring and up to the mid- 
dle before long, not so pleasant for the 
men and the rats! 

There have been no attacks latterly; 
the enemy has been too busy in Flanders 
where, thank Heaven, he has been getting 
Hell. As we get nearer we become more 
cautious, one must not look over the para- 
pet, one must make no noise, it brings the 
little lead bullets that sting like wasps. 
At the furthest point we peered over the 
top ; we are on the slope of a hill, beyond 
us nothing but devastation. This is "no 
man's land" where nothing but barbed 



86 "No. 6 



9 9 



wire grows and nothing but crows live. 
At night patrols venture forth, crawling 
on their stomachs towards each other's 
trenches to feel for foot-prints or to lis- 
ten. Sometimes a star-shell reveals them 
and they do not return; sometimes they 
meet out there in the dark. A prayer or 
an oath, a groan or a gurgle, one stays and 
the other comes back. Quite plainly you 
can see the rows of German trenches and 
it is strange to think that only a little way 
ofif they are watching us through their 
periscopes just as we are watching them. 
On the left is the village of Donevre : with 
the naked eye we can see the crooked 
streets and the holes in the roofs of the 
houses, but one sees no Germans. They 
live in the cellars and like bats only come 
forth at night. In the first line running 
parallel along the ridge are the observa- 



( ( 



No. 6'' 87 



tion posts, little armoured turrets where 
one sits in rare comfort peering through 
a little slit, rows of rifles and mitrail- 
leuses ever ready to spit lead. Very 
few men are kept in these front trenches ; 
they remain in the rear, ready to come up 
at the first sign of an attack. Shelling 
the trenches is consequently not suffi- 
ciently profitable, an occasional hit would 
not warrant the waste of powder. The 
uncertain wind in this hilly terrain makes 
the use of gas equally dangerous to both, 
the bleaching bones in ''no man's land" 
shows the result of attempting to take 
them by storm, so nothing happens and 
we return as we came, zigzagging 
through a labyrinth of traverses while the 
guns boom and the shells shriek as they 
fly over our heads. Latterly there have 
been several accidents at Montigny, — only 



88 ^^No. 6^^ 

last week two blacks were killed by a 
"marmite," — so the dressing station has 
been moved to an old barn down the road 
where we report to the Major and while 
awaiting orders we lunch, sharing our 
meal with some poilus, who in return 
give us soup and mashed potatoes. 

They are always so friendly, these sim- 
ple soldiers whom you learn to love, with 
a stripe or more on their arm that means 
a ride or more in one of our ambulances 
at some time or other, and their tales are 
vastly interesting, but they are tired of 
it all. Five sous a day and a grave in 
the end with a little white cross, ^'Ici re- 
pose" — one of a million whose lot it was 
to work and suffer and die. 

At one o'clock another car comes to re- 
lieve us and with a couple of "assis" we 
proceed upon our tour of "ramassage." 



^^No. 6'^ 89 

We visit in turn the villages of Migne- 
ville, Vaxainville, Reherrey and Mer- 
ville; there is but little left of these vil- 
lages except the cellars, the most useful 
part of these frontier houses, however. 
In each village there is an ^4nfirmerie" 
with a pile of straw for sick beds and a 
"brancard" for an operating table. The 
men to be evacuated are taken and left 
at one of the several large hospitals at 
Baccarat where they are fortunately bet- 
ter off. The day's work is over to begin 
again to-morrow. 

My room seems very luxurious to- 
night, the little cot very inviting. Lying 
snugly tucked away under a mountain of 
blankets one thinks of those out there 
with only the stars above and the mud 
beneath. 



Thursday, JOth August. 
After "soupe," which means dinner, 
we received an unexpected visit from our 
chief, accompanied by the head of the 
Red Cross and some staff officers. They 
have been making a tour of the sections 
bringing official word that what we had 
read in the papers was true; the govern- 
ment has decided to take over the serv- 
ice; our chief and his associates have re- 
signed. For me this means the end very 
shortly for I shall do as they have seen 
fit to do. To the silent little group that 
gathered about him in the growing dark- 
ness he said a few words, words that come 
straight from a man's heart and go to 
others, and then he was gone, this fellow 
we all love, who will no longer be our 

chief. 

90 



Friday, Jlst August. 

The service continues very light, less 
than half the cars go out every day and 
the idle moments are many; tant mieux, 
it means less wounded and France has had 
enough already. 

This afternoon I visited the great glass 
manufactory. Before the war they em- 
ployed 5,000 men, now there are about 
500, old, very old men and young, very 
young boys engaged chiefly in making bot- 
tles, bottles for medicines instead of the 
exquisite bottles for ladies' dressing- 
tables or gentlemen's sideboards. Quite 
the most extraordinary sight was the 
champion glass blower, pointed out to us 
with pride and envy by his fellow blow- 
ers. A cross, surly individual, unlike 

the others, who laugh at being laughed 
91 



92 ^^No. 6^^ 

at. He is old and insignificant until he 
gives a little puff, when his jowls swell 
like soap-bubbles; then he becomes a 
thing of curiosity and splendour, and 
when after a couple of preliminary 
swings he holds the long tube in his 
mouth and lets himself out he is indeed 
a thing to marvel at. The skin that dan- 
gles loosely from his cheeks bellies out 
like a child's toy balloon; there seems to 
be no limit, for they only stop swelling 
when he has accomplished his purpose 
and the molten glass becomes a lamp 
chimney or a giant electric light bulb. 

It is strange what people do to live and 
what importance they attach to living; 
would he were near when next I puncture 
a tire! 

After dinner, this being a night off, I 
went to the movies, all that Baccarat of- 



'^No. 6^^ 93 

fers in the way of entertainment. In the 
usual hall the usual audience of poilus 
and the usual sickening pictures of cheap 
sentimentality. On the way home the 
^^club," a back room in the Hotel Dupont 
where there is a piano and some beer and 
smoke and tales of the day's work, work 
that is done and means bed and rest. 



Saturday, 1st September. 
No. 6 is '^en alerte," which means that 
No. 6 must be ready to go out in case of a 
call for any special service, but no call 
comes, so after a day spent waiting we 
turn in, half dressed, still '^en alerte.'' 

NO MAN'S LAND 

There is a land that no man dare 
To call his own, no man would care, — 
This hell-swept waste of stench and mire 
Of rusty spikes and tangled wire 
Where corpses rot, faces upturned, 
Torn, split and emptied, charred and burned. 
A land of death where nothing grows, 
Where nothing lives but worms and crows, 
Land of bleaching bones and devastation 
Of mournful hope and utter desolation — 
You are Death's, and his hoary hand 
Stretches ever o'er No Man's Land. 
94 



Sunday, 2nd September. 

At 5.40 a. m. an urgent call came for 
an ambulance, so we opened her up and 
raced off to Azerailles, a little town four 
kilometres away, where we collected a' 
badly wounded fellow; fortunately he 
was unconscious and the bumps that break 
your heart when you have a groaning load 
of them meant nothing to him. We got 
him back to the hospital still alive but 
the knowing orderly shook his head and 
the good sister murmured a prayer, so I 
fear it was all for nothing. 

This afternoon the Boches came; they 
come quite often and rarely miss a Sun- 
day. It is not easy to pot them but we 
drove them off with no damage here al- 
though they raised the devil with a little 
95 



96 "No. 6 



> 9 



town over which they passed on their way 
back. It is wonderful how they fly, these 
birdmen; one of our own appeared as I 
was standing on the bridge after vespers. 
From a tremendous height he swooped 
down upon us, circling the church steeple 
and ofif again, but our cheers and the ex- 
tra glass of Pinard or Poilu that he must 
have had with his Sunday dinner brought 
him back. Flying upside down seemed 
to be his special delight with a nose dive 
now and then and a loop the loop here 
and there. 

There is a little cafe opposite the cris- 
tallerie, a dingy little place frequented 
by soldiers. Passing by on the way home 
I heard the strains of a violin; some one 
was playing, playing divinely. In a 
dimly lighted room thick with smoke, 
dozens of poilus were crowded about 



the bare tables with half empty beer 
glasses and saucers piled high. Silently 
they sat with their hairy chins buried in 
their hairy paws listening to a poilu 
pla}^ His music had put them in a 
serious mood, but just as music has the 
power to create moods within us so it 
changes them at will, and when a moment 
later he started some gay French song, 
his body swaying from side to side, the 
glasses began to clink once more and they 
roared the words of a refrain that must 
be censored. 

So it went, one moment we were a gay, 
laughing crowd, the next silent and sad 
with far-away thoughts. Romano, for 
that is his name, has a great soul. For 
years he played at Monte Carlo; now he 
is here like all of us playing for higher 
Stakes with the ever booming guns to ac- 



98 ^^No. 6^^ 

company the fiddle he caresses more 
fondly than a mistress. 

Long after hours we remained, but 
happy hours come to an end just as do the 
unhappy ones, I hope, so out into the 
night still singing ^'Madelon,'' and home 
through streets dark and deserted except 
for the sentinels who stand guard with 
one eye open and one eye closed. 

QUAND MADELON. 

"Pour le repos, le plaisir du militaire 
II est la-bas a deux pas de la foret 
Une maison aux murs tout couverts de llerre 
"Aux Tour-lou-rou" c'est le nom du cabaret. 
La servente est jeune et gentille 
Legere comme un papillon 
Comme son vin son oeil petllle; 
Nous I'appelons Madelon. 

Nous en revons la nult nous en pensons le jour — 
Ce n'est que Madelon, mais pour nous c*est 
Tamour," 



No. 6 



Refrain 



99 



"Quand Madelon frole son jupon 

Et chacun lui raconte une histoire 

Une histoire a sa fagon 

La Madelon pour nous n'est pas severe 

Quand on lui prend la taille ou le menton, 

Elle rit, c'est tout le mal qu'elF sait faire- 

Madelon— Madelon— Madelon !" 



^Monday, 3rd September. 

No. 6 required a bit of attention as No. 
6 often does, otherwise a lazy day ^'en re- 
pos." While working over the car a grey- 
haired fellow who begged a bit of essence 
for his briquet told me how he got his 
^^croix de guerre" in 1914. 

"It was tough in Lorraine when we 
drove them from Luneville but worse, 
nom de Dieu, up north. Eight of us 
were in a stable shooting through the 
windows when a marmite came through 
the roof. I carried the sergeant to a 
poste a kilometre away. No, he wasn't 
so heavy with only one leg, and he fit very 
snugly in the hole in my shoulder. The 
others — you could have picked them up 
in a bag. C'est tout/' 



100 



^^No. 6'' loi 

To-night our good friends, the French 
officers from Montigny, messed with us 
and we spent a jolly evening at the 
^^Club." 

Work when you have to, play when you can, 
Shoot them and stick them, care not a damn, 
Hug them and kiss them, there is no ban, 
"C'est la guerre J Madame/^ 



Tuesday, 4th September. 
There is very little activity these days; 
they are too busy up north. To-night we 
gave a concert to some of the French offi- 
cers and my poilu artist played for us. 
Life is a dreary march towards a tomb, 
^^en passant il faut etre gai," especially 
soldiers who often march quickly. 



102 



Wednesday, September §th. 

Cars Nos. 5 and 6 go to Badonviller 
for twenty-four hours. At 12 we leave, 
arriving at 12.45. ''S'il y a des coups de 
main" we shall have work, but this 
afternoon all is quiet. Now and again 
our batteries salute the Germans, now 
and again the Germans return the com- 
pliment. 

There is but little left of Badonviller; 
it was completely shot up the first weeks 
of the war when it was taken and retaken 
several times by both sides. The houses 
are without roofs, the walls that remain 
standing rent by great shell holes and 
pierced by shrapnel. The streets are still 
littered with the hastily constructed bar- 
ricades of timber and barbed wire that 
103 



I04 ^^No. 6^^ 

were thrown up during the first attacks 
when they fought all over the place, and 
here are also the permanent ones built 
later by the Germans of cement and 
Krupp's steel. Those must have been hot 
times when the French held one streetand 
the Germans another, when the ^'mitrail- 
leuse" in the darkness killed their own. 
After days of desperate fighting the Ger- 
mans succeeded in taking the cemetery, 
over the graves and in and out of the 
tombs they fought. The dead must have 
had a day of it with fellows overhead 
sticking bayonets into each other and 
bashing in skulls. For several days the 
French were able to keep the church, 
with their machine guns mounted upon 
the altars vomiting lead through holes 
knocked in the walls, but the Germans 
had heavy artillery and when they 



**No. 6" los 



brought it up and got the range there 
was no more church, no more Frenchmen. 
A few little flowers have sprung up out 
of their blood; their bones are buried 
amongst the stones and mortar but their 
spirit remains and their souls are immor- 
tal. 

Countless wooden crosses within the 
tumbled down walls of the cemetery 
mark the graves of many other heroic 
Frenchmen. Your noble sacrifice was 
not in vain; the lives you gave to check 
the first onslaught of the Huns saved 
France and France saved the world. The 
few civilians who returned when it was 
all over and when the Germans were fi- 
nally driven out live in cellars and go 
about their business with gas-masks ever 
ready, for Badonviller is scarcely a kilo- 
metre from the first lines. 



io6 **No. 6'* 



The old woman in whose house we are 
quartered owes her life to her "metier 
de sage femme," and the fact that when 
the Germans occupied the town her serv- 
ices were required by a German woman. 
We have come to help her country so 
she cannot do enough for us, the good 
soul. She cooks the food we bring and 
lets us sleep in her dining-room. 

After calling upon the "Major du can- 
tonment" for orders and finding none, I 
visited the trenches. Back of the ceme- 
tery on the hill they begin and for a mile 
one winds in and out of the "boyaux" 
that lead to the first lines. Overhead the 
shells whistle in an everlasting game of 
battledore and shuttlecock "et on s'en 
f ." The trenches are splendidly con- 
structed with directions everywhere, a 
corduroy flooring that keeps them fairly 



( ( 



No. 6" 107 



dry and every few hundred metres en- 
trances to elaborate dug-outs where deep 
down, vast quantities of supplies, muni- 
tions and men are stored. The advanced 
machine gun positions are arranged so 
that each gun will sweep a certain ter- 
rain, leaving not a square foot uncovered. 
They are in communication by telephone 
with the listening-posts still closer up and 
the batteries that would protect them by 
barrage fire in case of massed attack. At 
night they have a system of signals: one 
green light means to fire, two green lights 
fire continuously, red light to ask for ar- 
tillery support, white light all well. The 
most advanced post is known as a listen- 
ing-post and was located in a little thicket 
only occupied in the daytime. Here 
thirty yards from the Boche were a hand- 
ful of soldiers with a rifle in one hand and 



I08 ^^No, 6^^ ^^ 

a hand grenade in the other, ever on the 
alert. One peers through a little peri- 
scope and fancies that an equally vigilant 
German eye is peering back; it is a queer 
sensation and you are ready to duck if you 
see a grenade coming your way. 

They tell you strange tales, these chaps, 
and you do not wonder when they ask in 
a whisper when it will finish. 

The days are getting short, soon it will 
be winter; it is almost dark and time to 
return, back as we came, to our soup. 

Our versatile midwife is a rare 
"cuisto." Somehow or other she man- 
aged to get a few eggs for an omelet, and 
with fried potatoes, some "singe" and a 
bottle of 'Tinard" one cannot grumble. 
Madame likes her "verre," too, so she sat 
down with us and told us many tales of 
German atrocities; how the Mayor's wife 



'*No. 6" 109 



had been shot for looking out of a win- 
dow, how a little boy who had been sent 
by a brute of an officer to fetch some 
water was shot upon his return and while 
still alive thrown into the fire. In the 
Mairie there is a roll of honour with the 
names of all those who were murdered 
and how they met their fate. It is use- 
less to recite this litany of crimes, mur- 
der, rape, arson, nothing did they omit. 
The room above was used as an operat- 
ing room and ward. A French boy of 
ten, who day and night had been made to 
work for them, was badly wounded by a 
shell fragment. While lying upon one of 
the cots he was observed by an officer, who 
calmly threw him through the window 
to squash what was left of his poor man- 
gled little body in the street below. 



no ^^No. 6'^ 

God damn the Germans! "Goddamn" 
is a prayer. 

There are no lights when night comes. 
The village is a village of dead. We 
climbed the hill that leads past the ceme- 
tery and out beyond where no man lives 
and all is still, still because every now 
and again a white rocket flares up, but a 
red or green one would change it all. 

The guns are asleep, to-night it is per- 
fectly dark and quiet until a star-shell 
goes up, as they do every few moments, 
lighting up "no man's land" where none 
must venture. As far as one can see they 
are bursting, these beautiful star-shells, 
making day of the night from here to the 
North Sea. 

On our return we found the Major 
who came to share a bottle of beer, and 
we heard further tales of German atroci- 



*^No. 6^' III 

ties and the Kultur of Von Bernhardi. 
May the day of reckoning soon come! 
This is our prayer as we roll ourselves up 
in our blankets upon the brancards that 
less fortunate ones have found less com- 
fortable. 



Thursday, 6th September, 
We are relieved at the expiration of 
our 24 hours and return to Baccarat pass- 
ing through Peronne and Vacqueville for 
any sick or wounded on the way. 

To-day there is bad news from the out- 
side world; the Germans have taken Riga 
and the situation is very gloomy. 

Russia and the Russians! they have 
failed us and it is for them that France is 
at warl 



112 



Friday, Jth September, 
"Apres le travail le plaisir, apres la 
pluie le beau temps." The sun was 
warm this afternoon and we had a glori- 
ous bathe in the Meuthe where I left a 
few ^'cooties," and then a peaceful siesta 
on the shady banks where I collected a 
few insects. 

It must be quite easy to kill when the 
day is grim and stormy; to-day it would 
be hard, but guns of steel have no hearts 
and men's hearts have become of steel; 
so the guns are never still, but they are 
far away and the occasional boom has a 
pleasant sound, a mellow soothing rum- 
ble that lulls one to sleep, — to sleep and 
dream of the years that are gone and of 

those that may never come. 
113 



114 **No. 6'' 



If it ever ends how I shall live! The 
hours I have squandered, the pleasures I 
have ignored, no longer will they escape 
me; my cup will be full and I shall drink 
to the dregs. I shall taste for the first 
time the happiness of things and hours 
that meant nothing before. For the first 
time I shall know the '^joie de vivre." 
"To breathe in the sunshine of a happy 
day, to drink in the moonlight of a happy 
night." Wild fancies, these, when to- 
morrow a shapeless carcass may be all 
that is left to rot by the wayside. 

Awake with a start; the sun is setting 
in the west, and the guns are grumbling 
in the east. 



Saturday, 8th September. 
To-day we go to Herberviller; it is not 
our most advanced post, but it is the most 
disagreeable, as here the Germans have 
left nothing. The population has gone 
forever, there is not even a dog or a stray 
cat. Ruins everywhere, among which 
live a few soldiers and ourselves. Our 
garage is what is left of a house next to 
the ^'infirmerie," where there is a tele- 
phone that summons us wherever we may 
be needed. 

As there seems to be no need of us at 
present I walked over to St. Martin along 
a well shelled road. The Germans are 
on their good behaviour to-day, not that 
the swine know how to behave but they 
have been saving their ammunition lat- 



115 



ii6 **No. 6'^ 

terly. St. Martin is like most of the 
towns in this region ; a demolished church 
surrounded by demolished houses, occu- 
pied only by soldiers ^'en repos" but al- 
ways working. In the village repairing 
"abris," in the fields digging trenches, in 
the graveyards digging fresh graves for 
comrades who might just as well be dig- 
ging theirs. It may be luck, it may be 
destiny, or maybe but the caprice of a 
shrapnel shell. 

The surgeon in charge of the "in- 
firmerie" was on his way out to visit the 
Captain in one of the advanced posts; a 
short walk over the hills brought us to 
the entrance of the ^^boyaux" through 
which we made our way, finally emerging 
in a little wood about a kilometre from 
the German lines. Here we found the 
Captain peacefully smoking in the door 



**No. 6'' 117 



of his luxurious dug-out. It was the 
hour to make the rounds so we set out 
through more complicated trenches and 
traverses that led us, unperceived by the 
enemy, through fields of barbed wire and 
shell holes to No. i "poste de resistance," 
located in a clump of trees with a stretch 
of "no man's land" separating us from the 
Boches whose positions were a few hun- 
dred yards away. 

These P. R., or posts of resistance, take 
the place of trenches ; they are thrust out 
as far as possible and command the ter- 
rain between themselves and similar ones 
on their right and left. This particular 
one is occupied by about 50 men, mostly 
'^Annamites" who, because of their alert- 
ness, make excellent sentinels under the 
command of French sous officiers. If 
attacked they resist as best they can until 



ii8 *^No. 6^^ 

relieved or killed. ^'En attendant" they 
live in their dug-outs ever on the watch, 
on the watch for the German patrols that 
come at night to cut their wire and get 
behind them. Only last week a captain 
and his orderly were set upon and killed 
by some Germans who in the night had 
managed to get through and were hiding 
in the thicket. So every morning the 
wood is beaten and when a twig snaps or 
a tree stirs in the lazy afternoon breeze 
a dozen rifles are pointed m that direc- 
tion. 

For days they have been trying to catch 
a dog who comes over from the German 
lines, a mysterious fellow on his way no 
one knows where, but they think he once 
lived in the '^pays," and is being used by 
some Boche to carry messages back and 
forth. Several times he has been seen, 



^^No. 6^' 119 

usually about dusk, but each time he got 
away, as orders had been given not to 
shoot him, so as to find out where he went. 
Poor brute, keep away, the orders have 
been changed and you are to be shot the 
next time you appear, like any other 
Boche. 

After a careful inspection, orders were 
given for a patrol to go out that night. 
The sergeant takes his orders, salutes, and 
walks away as if he had been ordered to 
clean a pair of boots. 

C'est la guerre! 

By a series of underground traverses 
we reached Post No. 2 where everything 
was equally quiet although the night be- 
fore they were obliged to drive off some 
Germans. 

Brave fellows, these, who sit around 
calmly smoking until they are killed; 



I20 *^No. 6'^ 

some day an attack comes and they need 
no orders to remain. A cloud of gas or 
a rain of shells will keep them but they 
will die hard in their little dug-outs cov- 
ered by sandbags and closed in by barbed 
wire, die as they lived, — for France. This 
is the spirit that saved us, this is what all 
the diabolical German inventions cannot 
overcome. And just as this undaunted 
spirit born of a just cause makes men fight 
all the harder in bad moments, so the lack 
of it will make the Boche give up quicker 
when his bad moments come, as they 
surely will. 

Back as we came with enemy avions 
amongst the little white puffs of shrapnel 
in a cloudless sky and the shells that 
whistle everlastingly back and forth. 

Dinner over a little fire in the cool of 
the evening, and sleep rolled up in a dirty 



**No. 6" 121 



blanket on a filthy stretcher, sleep and 
dreams of a world left behind. 

In the middle of the night a call came 
from St. Martin, where we arrived to find 
our friend the sergeant shot through the 
foot and a little yellow Chinaman with a 
bad leg. The patrol that went out to 
reconnoitre was discovered, a heavenly 
star-shell and a hellish mitrailleuse did 
the trick. 

So we return our friend's hospitality 
with a long ride to Ogerviller and Bac- 
carat, trying hard to avoid the bumps on 
a very black night. 



Sunday, September the Qth, 
After a night of it one is glad to be re- 
lieved and return to Baccarat for a bath 
and a rest. In the evening we gather at 
the Hotel Dupont which has become our 
club, to drink beer and swap stories, 
stories of shells that nearly blew a wheel 
off and shells that really blew a leg off. 

I heard of a fellow whose hands were 
blown off by a hand grenade. They did 
what they could to make him comfort- 
able. Between bumps and moans he 
said very simply, '^Ca va bien, I gave my 
life to France; she has only taken my 
hands." 

Bedtime comes and then to-morrow 
when it begins again, this endless round 
of 'Tostes de secours" giving up their 
endless quota of wounded. 



122 



Monday, September lOth, 
More bad news from Russia ; I fear we 
can no longer count upon them. 

One grows very fond of the Poilus; 
great indeed are their qualities and great 
the debt we owe them. The general does 
not share the soldier's hardships and mis- 
ery, the soldier does not share the gen- 
eral's glory and recognition. 

I called at the hospital to see my friend 
the sergeant; his foot is doing famously 
and he will be back in a fortnight with 
another stripe on his arm and another 
foot to be shot. 

"Bonne chance mon vieux" — "Merci Monsieur** — 
And be up with his kit and away 
With a stripe on his arm for the blood he'd shed 
And a patched up side where he'd bloody well bled 

For France. 
123 



124 **No. 6" 



He's done his bit but there's more to do 
It will not be through for the "brave poilu" 
'Til his life is spent or the battle won, 
'Til he's smashed the Boche and finished the Hun 

For France. 

This is the spirit of legions in blue 

The every thought of every poilu 

Who gives life gladly that France may live 

— So long live France! 

Sometimes you see them with four and 
five stripes; it means that four or five 
times they have been wounded, shot full 
of lead from a machine gun, hit by a 
hand grenade that rips you open or a 
piece of shell that tears a jagged hole in 
a belly to empty its entrails, to fall in a 
Hell-swept shell crater wondering if the 
end has come, praying that it has. 

To bleed and curse and thirst for hours, 
sometimes days; the agony of being 
moved with a mangled leg or a shattered 



arm, to be carried on a back or a stretcher 
to a dressing station, to be dumped on a 
pile of straw to wait your turn; the tor- 
ture of being patched up, then a hellish 
ride in an ambulance that jolts your heart 
out. Bloody, muddy, sticking bandages 
to be torn off and at last sleep, the brief 
merciful sleep of chloroform while they 
cut and burn and sew. Nights of fever 
and thirst, days of dressings and anguish, 
finally well. A few days of rest and 
back — back for another stripe. 



Tuesday, Ilth September, 
Montigny. The officers of the 37th 
have left and Montigny is more desolate 
than ever. The Boches shelled our ga- 
rage so we have been obliged to change. 
Our present one is between two walls, 
which seem like the tower of Pisa, always 
about to fall, the floor black mud, the 
roof blue sky. 

All the afternoon we were busy but 
after ^'la soupe" there was nothing to do, 
so I strolled up the hill and sat in the 
graveyard watching the rockets "out 
there." 

After the grim daylight, night, 
Night and the stars and the sea, 
Only the stars and the sea 
And the star-shorn sails and spars. 
Naught else in the world for me. 
126 



( < 



No. 6" 127 



In the presence of anything vast, a moun- 
tain or the expanse of the sea, we realise 
our own insignificance, how futile life is. 

"On entre, on crfe, c'est la vie; 
On crie, on sort, c'est la mort." 

What difference does it all make? If 
one believes in a hereafter what does it 
matter if one arrives a little sooner or 
later, this fleeting existence is not even a 
drop in the bucket of eternity; if one be- 
lieves in nothing hereafter, then again 
what difference does it make? So you 
whose bones lie bleaching out there con- 
sole yourselves. 

In the stillness in the distance you can 
hear horses' hoofs and the creaking of 
heavy wagons; the Germans bringing up 
their supplies. Slowly the moon comes 
out from behind a cloud. 



128 ^^No. 6^^ 

"La nuit vient, tout se tut, les flambeaux s'eteigni- 

rent 
Dans les bofs assombrls, les sources se plalgnirent 
Le rosslgnol cache dans son nid tenebreux 
Chanta comme un poete et comme un amoureux. 
Chacun se dispersa sous les profonds feuillages 
Les folles en riant entralnerent les sages 
L'amante s'en alia dans I'ombre avec I'amant 
Et, trouble comme on Test en songe, vaguement, 
lis sentaient par degres se meler a leur ame 
A leurs discours secrets, a leur regard de flamme, 
A leurs coeurs, a leurs sens, a leur molle ralson 
Le clair de lune bleu qui baignait Thorizon." 

Sometimes it is good to be alive; not 
always, but the moon goes back behind 
his great black cloud, and ^4e clair de 
lune bleu qui baignait Thorizon" ends, — 
ends like life, like love, like everything. 

"J'ai le cafard," a vague longing to be 
somewhere, a vague yearning for some- 
thing; maybe sleep that brings forgetful- 
ness will drive you away. Good-night, 



*^No. 6^^ 129 

squelettes beneath your heavy tombstones. 
They must have put them there for me 
to stumble over. Surely they were not 
needed to keep you in your peaceful 
graves, surely the dead would not want to 
come back — to be killed. 

We planned a night of comfort and 
luxuriousness; we put up our cots beside 
an ambulance and turned in, but one by 
one the stars disappear, just as one by one 
they appeared, and it begins to rain; so 
we pack them into a shed across the road 
amongst the horses and the manure. 
War makes strange bed-fellows. 

Oh! for a fire I know — 
The storm and the night outside, 
The embers that smoulder and glow 
And a friend by the fireside ! 



Wednesday, I2th September. 
Baccarat again and more bad news 
from the outside world, further disturb- 
ances in Russia! Has Russia not been 
sufficiently disturbed? More revolu- 
tions! Has Russia not been sufficiently 
revolutionised with the abolition of vodka 
and the abdication of the Czar? The ma- 
jority of Russians are too barbaric and 
backward to be modernised, the minority 
too modern and advanced to fit into the 
present scheme of life. If at the outset 
the Allies had taken hold of their coun- 
try and resources, built them a few thou- 
sand versts of railroad, equipped and 
officered their vast armies as Germany 
did for Turkey, the war might now be 

over. Now if Germany succeeds in 
130 



^*No. 6^^ 131 

overcoming and utilising Russia as she 
did Belgium, will the war ever end? 

Sometimes I fancy the world reverting 
to feudal times, one half fighting the 
other half; intrenched within their for- 
tresses, living on forever within them- 
selves, just as the old barons in mediaeval 
times fortified themselves against their 
neighbours, making of their domain their 
world. 



Thursday, 13th September. 

One car is now permanently stationed 
at Badonviiler and one at Ogerviller 
where they remain one week in service, 
consequently two cars less go out each day 
and this brings us an additional day off 
duty. 

More casualties in our ranks, more 
brandy and castor oil. 

Sometimes in the midst of it all you get 
a strange emotion. I passed to-day, com- 
ing in from the front, a great motor lorry 
piled high with knapsacks, helmets, 
boots, and dirty torn tunics with dark red 
stains. 

**Man wants but little here below 
Nor wants that little long." 
It takes not long, it takes but little 
To forget him when he's gone. 
132 



September 14th, Friday, 
Terrible news! not of the war or any- 
thing so trivial. The Hotel Dupont has 
been placed '^en consigne" for ten days 
for serving officers between the hours. 
The Marquise is terribly upset and so 
are we; surely we cannot be without our 
club! Off I go to see the General Staff 
and things are arranged. 

When I came for my coffee after din- 
ner the Marquise and Helene gave me a 
hug and presented me to two charm- 
ing Parisiennes. ''C'est drole, la vie." 
Their brother, a brave little chasseur, was 
killed two years ago, so on the anniversary 
they come to say a prayer and put a few 

poor little flowers on his grave. Done 
133 



134 **No, 6^^ 

this afternoon, to-morrow they go, to- 
night we dance. 

It's a strange life where nothing 
counts, not even death. 



September 15th, Saturday, 
"She loved me for the dangers I had 
passed, and I loved her that she did pity 
them." How often have we sneered at 
these lines in "Othello," not so to-day 
when I had a narrow escape. This care- 
less life makes one very callous; who will 
ever go to Africa again to shoot a lion or 
to the Rockies for a bear? Precious lit- 
tle excitement it would afford after this 
hunt for bigger game! 

The French have always been an excit- 
able people. I wonder at the lack of 
emotion in the soldier no matter what is 
going on. 

"It's quite simple," as one of them ex- 
plained, "si on se f pas mal de sa 

peau on deviendrait fou." 
135 



136 **No. 6 



9 9 



A lad in his twenties with long, wavy 
hair and long, slender fingers, who, were 
it not for the war, might be playing the 
violin at the Cabaret Rouge in the Latin 
Quarter or dreaming and writing verse 
in a garret in Montmartre. It is strange 
how they take to the grim business of war, 
these mere boys ; over night they become 
men, hardened to it all, a night of such 
horrors as I have heard described; they 
learn to kill with the best of them who, 
the day before, would have shuddered at 
the thought 

A look of amusement came over his 
boyish face as he told me how he had 
^^zigouille" a Boche: 

^'It went in like butter but I stuck it in 
too hard and it would not come out. I 
had to put my foot on him and pull. Oof ! 
it was terrible to feel him wriggle." 



Gone the look of amusement and a look 
of horror comes over a man's face. 

This afternoon I visited the hospital to 
see a friend. What a hellish and heav- 
enly place, a hospital ward, with its at- 
mosphere of carbolic and suffering, rows 
of cots and glass tables, perambulators 
with bottles of disinfectants and reme- 
dies. Angels in white that quietly come 
and go and smile and care; sick and 
wounded getting better or dying, clean 
and comfortable, as comfortable as they 
can be made, for beneath the white sheets 
legs and arms are gone— or worse. How 
much suffering and resignation there is 
expressed on these pale countenances that 
smile so bravely to conceal it all. 

My friend is no longer here. I 
brought him in two days ago, shot 
through the chest, thanking me for going 



138 **No. 6'' 



slowly, begging me for water, dripping 
blood all the way. That is why my 
friend is no longer here. *'Mort pour la 
France," — it has already been painted on 
a million white crosses upon which the 
sun is setting. How many more upon 
which the sun will rise? As it goes 
down over the hills to rise somewhere else 
it leaves me with the "cafard" — "le caf- 
ard" for that somewhere. 



LE CAFARD 

Like a ghost to haunt you 
It comes in the night 
To mock and taunt you 
In the moonlight. 
When shadows are strange 
And all the world is still 
It comes to disturb you 
And to possess your will. 



Into your thoughts creeping 

Things unheard, unseen, 

Fancies saturating, 

Blotting out the senses ; 

Fining your empty heart 

With a vague wanting, 

Your empty soul 

With a veiled longing, 

Your empty arms w^ith a mad yearning 

Till your soul is craving 
For something near and far — 
It comes in the night 
In the moonlight — 
Le Cafard, 



Saturday, 15th September. 

We took some Boche prisoners at 
Montigny, or rather they came over dur- 
ing the night as they sometimes do. They 
tell the usual tale of hunger and hard- 
ship to excite pity, but they do not look it. 
Starvation exists in Germany but only the 
useless starve. With their brutal effi- 
ciency the Germans feed their armies; 
the old, the decrepit, the unnecessary 
starve. 

The lines occupied by the 8th Army ex- 
tend as far as the Rendez-vous des Chas- 
seurs, where I went this morning with 
some officers. 

"Ah! le beau jardin," exclaimed Louis 

XIV when he saw these beautiful Vosges 

mountains in Alsace, and a beautiful gar- 
140 



**No. 6'* 141 



den it is, indeed. Wonderful hills cov- 
ered with pines, cool streams that mur- 
mur and trickle slowly down into the val- 
ley below where the meadows are red 
with poppies — and blood. Way up 
amongst the hills close to the sky is the 
Rendez-vous des Chasseurs, too heavenly 
a spot for hellish doings, but the pictur- 
esque dugouts that look like chalets in 
Switzerland are covered with sand-bags, 
for the shells do not always whistle harm- 
lessly by. The commandant's house is a 
miniature castle built of granite with tur- 
rets and a moat and a proud device over 
the little gateway, ^'Ils ne passeront pas," 
sublime words that recall Verdun, ^'They 
shall not pass," nor did they. History 
will record glorious names, glorious 
deeds, la Marne, la Somme, I'Aisne, but 
none more glorious than Verdun where 



142 **No. 6'' 

German Kultur shattered itself against 
French valour. 

Half a mile away are the Boches who 
will never be nearer paradise, — let us 
hope they will soon be farther. 

On the way in we stopped at the Vil- 
lage Negre, so called because it was built 
by the black troops who occupied it in 
1914. For months the Germans never 
ceased shelling them, so they dug them- 
selves in little by little and to-day there is 
an underground village on the side of the 
hill, with quarters for thousands, hospi- 
tals, storehouses, everything underground. 
One sees nothing but little entrances that 
lead to the elaborate dwellings. Here 
and there smoke curls lazily out of the 
ground where far below they cook and 
eat and live like ants. 

I dined to-night with some French of- 



**No. 6" 143 



ficers; one of them is known as "Le 
Mort.'^ He was in command of a bat- 
tery that was hit fairly. When the smoke 
blew away there was no battery. Days 
after when they came to clean up the 
debris they found him half buried and 
half dead. But ^'Le Mort" is still very 
much alive and has another battery if 
the Germans need proof. 

Together we stroll home through the 
night, "Le Mort"— Death — and myself, 
through streets deserted but for the ever 
vigilant sentries wrapped in their great 
coats tramping wearily up and down or 
huddled up in their little coffin-like 
boxes. 

In the cafes there is light and warmth 
and wine — and more soldiers clinking 
glasses singing Madelon — "pour le re- 
pos du militaire" — out there where the 



144 ^^No. e'' 

rain falls softly and the mud is everlast- 
ing, more soldiers watching and waiting 
for death — ''le seul repos du militaire," 
but amongst all these weary soldiers not 
one who will not go on living, or if needs 
be, die for France. 

For three long years and a half they 
have borne the brunt of it; their courage 
has been sublime — there have been bad 
moments, but in the midst of them they 
have never faltered. 

The savage finds a delight in fighting 
— even the English find an enjoyment in 
a life of excitement and adventure. The 
German does it in his stolid way, as a 
child goes to bed, because he is told to. 
The Russian revels in things reckless and 
mad, but the French love life too well — 
they love their food, their wine, their 
women. To gladly give all is the hero- 



^*No. e'' 145 

ism of France, in whose heart there is sor- 
row but upon whose soul is graven the 
stern Roman motto, ''Vae Victis" — so the 
Huns shall be brought to account and 
made drink to the dregs from the cup of 
skulls they fashioned, the tears they 
caused to flow. 

Two letters have come, one from the 
chief informing me that my liberation 
had been asked for. I have been offered 
a commission and am to proceed to 
Paris immediately. 

The other from General , asking 

me if my views had not changed. No! 
my convictions are stronger than ever, all 
this will not bring a military decision. 

Germany must be beaten by other 
means, but Germany will be beaten for 
France will never stop until the peace 
they long for is theirs — the peace they 



146 "No. 6 



> f 



owe their dead, real peace, that only a 
real victory will bring. 

France has given much, has much to 
give; France will give her all. Her sac- 
rifice will not have been in vain if war 
in the future be but a thing of the past. 



Sunday, l6th September. 

How cold it is when the day breaks; 
often have I lain awake in the night in 
this little room haunted by ^4e caffard" 
for far-away places. 

I leave for Paris at eight. How often 
shall I lay awake in far-away places 
haunted by '4e cafard" for this little 
room — for the good friends of Section 59 
—and "No. 6." 



147 



POILU TERMS 

boyaux communicating trenches 

brancard stretcher 

cachabis dug-out 

cafard yearning 

camion motor lorry 

cuisto cook 

embusque slacker 

en panne broken down 

en planton in reserve 

genie engineers 

marmite big shell 

(and so) marmite shelled 

Pinard wine 

149 



I50 **No. 6'* 



popotte mess 

"Rosalie" the bayonet 

zigouiller to bayonet 



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